by N E Riggs
Volk typed quickly into his com pad then held it around so everyone could see the picture. The creature on the screen looked human, but the eyes were vacant and the flesh rotted. “The jiang shi are the restless undead, granted a semblance of life by the Nephilim,” Volk said. “If they touch a person, that person becomes a jiang shi, not alive and not dead. Along with the afancs, blemmyes, and tiyanaks, they are the worst monsters in the cosmos, closest to the Nephilim. They don’t move very fast, but they are relentless. And they can’t be killed.”
Saikee bit her lip. “If they can’t be killed, though, and we let them into Jod, what’s to stop them turning everyone on Bantong into more jiang shi?”
“Oh, the Sword Priests know how to handle them.” Volk waved a hand. “They cover themselves in armor and push the jiang shi back with riot shields. The gateway to world 235 opens about once a year, so they’re used to it. Best of all, the jiang shi know about the gateway and when it opens, so they’ll be ready to come through.”
“Perfect,” Odi said. “I can think of no better fate for Law Priests than to become something they hate, fated to suffer for eternity.” He turned to Tresas. “And we can ensure that they find you before anyone else. Why don’t you ponder that for a while, and see if it inspires any visions?”
Tresas shivered, tears rolling down her cheeks, and David had to look away.
*
“So we’re definitely using jiang shi?” Seth asked, a crease between his brows.
Volk pushed his com pad aside. “I think they’re our best choice. I mean, sure, the dinosaurs would be fun, but they rarely walk through gateways.”
Seth wrapped his arms around himself. “It’s just… what if the Sword Priests don’t get the jiang shi soon enough? Or what if some of them get away? We could end up destroying all of Bantong, ourselves included.”
David looked up from Volk’s com pad. “Don’t underestimate the Sword Priests. They’ve got plenty of resources.” He tried not to imagine the sixth division fighting off jiang shi. “The gateway opens in two days. That’s plenty of time to get set up.” He didn’t look towards the other end of the room, where Odi, Intu, and Musha sat with Tresas. Up until a few minutes ago, she’d been screaming. “Has there been any news about someone breaking into Shamla?”
Volk played with his com pad for a moment, then news bulletins popped up. “Nothing.” He shook his head.
“That can’t be right,” Saikee said. “You made a mess when you kidnapped her.” She glanced towards Tresas, then looked away with a shiver.
“She yelled out for someone too,” David said, feeling distant.
“The Passion Priests are probably keeping it quiet for now,” Volk said, typing rapidly. “They’ll have to admit something eventually. Maybe only after they send the Sword Priests after you.” He smirked at David. “Scared?”
David stared at the com pad. “I don’t care. So long as no one finds me till after the attack on Jod.” Ever since he’d been defrocked, he’d known he wouldn’t last long. After he got his revenge, he didn’t care what happened. Well, maybe if he had time, he’d pay one more visit to Brigid. She’d taken away his chance to get home, and she deserved something special for that.
“Volk!” Intu cried suddenly. “I think she’s finally having a vision! Take notes!”
Volk, David, Seth, and Saikee joined the others at the far side of the table, Volk dragging his com pad along the tabletop. Tresas hung limply from her bounds, her hair falling all over. She had two black eyes, and her sleeves had been ripped away. Cuts littered both her arms, a few still slowly dripping blood. Her gaze was distant and unfocused, and her mouth moved a few times before she spoke. “A gateway to world 35,247 will appear in three days, two hours, and seventeen minutes at 15 degrees and 24 minutes north, 9 degrees and 47 minutes east. It will hold open for four minutes and two seconds.”
“What?” Musha said, scowling. “What is this?”
“It’s a gateway vision,” Odi said. “How wonderfully precise…”
Intu grunted. “However precise it is doesn’t really matter to us. It doesn’t help us at all. You didn’t have to copy it down,” he said to Volk who had typed it in.
“Might as well keep it.” Volk shrugged. “We can always sell the information.”
Tresas twitched, and David wondered if she was even listening to them. “A gateway to world 7489 will appear in five days, eighteen hours, and fifty-three minutes at 27 degrees and 2 minutes south and 33 degrees and 29 minutes east. It will hold open for two hours, nineteen minutes, and forty-five seconds.”
Odi ran fingers through his short, white beard. “I wonder how aware she is. I’ve heard that Passion Priests always work in pairs, so one can record the other’s visions. I never knew if that was true, or if it was simply so no details could be forgotten. She certainly doesn’t seem to hear herself.” He pulled out his knife and ran the tip gently along Tresas’s cheek, grasping the back of her head in his other hand. “Can you hear me?” he asked softly. Tresas shivered, and her eyes flickered. “I don’t need gateway visions, I need a real prophecy.”
“Can’t… force… prophecy…” Tresas’s lips barely moved.
“You said you couldn’t force regular visions either, yet we’ve seen the truth of that.” Odi ran the knife back up her face and traced her eye. “I wonder if you could still see visions with only one eye?”
“No!” Tresas cried, jerking back. Odi held her firmly in place. “No, please. I’ll… I’ll try.” Tears flowed down her face as she glanced around the room. “Prophecy is different,” she whispered. “Some Passion Priests never prophesize.”
Odi shook his head and clucked his tongue. “Regular Brothers and Sisters may not, but you’re a Steward. You’d only have attained that rank if you’ve already been given a prophecy. Come now, call out to Aeons or whatever you do. See something useful to us.”
Tresas wept harder, and David wondered if she really couldn’t control it. He wondered too if he could slip away without anyone noticing. He really didn’t want to see this. “Do we really need a prophecy?” he said. “I mean, don’t we already know everything we need to know?”
Saikee nodded. “Yes. Nothing she says will change the gateway for the jiang shi. Can’t we stop this?”
“Maybe she can tell us about a better gateway?” Seth said, shifting on his seat. “One with less frightening monsters?”
“Besides,” David said, “even if she does give us a prophecy, it might not do us any good. We might not know what it means. They can be pretty—” he cut off when he saw Tresas looking right at him. She didn’t blink, and her tears had dried up. Even though she stared right at him, David thought she wasn’t really seeing him. Her gaze was oddly distant.
“Burning,” Tresas said. Her voice sounded strange and distant. “Burning, burning.”
Odi leaned in eagerly, taking his knife away. “What’s burning?” he asked. “What do you see?”
Tresas didn’t look away from David. “You lie in a field, surrounded by the dead,” she said, her voice dull. “You stand tall while white cowers. The cursed ones dance beside you. Aeons lies still and silent before you.” She shuddered for a moment then collapsed.
“Got it,” Volk said, finishing typing.
“Got what?” Intu said, frowning at David.
Saikee pressed her hand against Tresas’s forehead. “I think she’s unconscious.” She pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed at the tears and blood. “What did all that mean?”
Everyone turned to David. He stared at them, his mind feeling sluggish. “Why would I know?”
“She was looking at you the whole time,” Musha said. “Her prophecy was clearly meant for you.” She turned to look at Odi, worried. “She said Aeons would lie still and silent. We can’t hurt Aeons. Maybe we should stop now.” Her voice turned soft.
“We stop nothing,” Odi said. “Prophecies always come true, but not always the way people think. By Aeons, she might have meant the Eternist pr
iesthood, since the Eternists serve Aeons. She also said the white would cower before David. Cardinals wear white. The Cardinals would surely consider us cursed, especially when we succeed.” He nodded. “There is no danger in our plan.”
David rubbed his arms. “She also said I’d be surrounded by the dead.” He’d been trying very hard not to think about what releasing the jiang shi would mean for the people of Jod. He pushed the thought aside. Odi, Musha, and Seth had looked for a long time to find a place where only Law Priests would come under attack. When he finally found the spot, Odi had been delighted. David didn’t need to worry about innocents getting in the way. “Passion Priests are the best at interpreting their own prophecies. We should ask Tresas.”
“You can stay, if you want to,” Odi said. “Someone needs to stay with her until the attack.” He stood and left the room with Musha and Intu. Volk copied the prophecy onto a piece of scrap paper then left too. Seth and Saikee lingered. They produced a first aid kit, and the three of them bandaged Tresas’s cuts. They sat silent with David, watching Tresas as she slumped unconscious. Hours later, when she finally started to rouse, they left too. David couldn’t blame them for leaving.
“How do you feel?” he asked as Tresas blinked her eyes and looked around.
She sat up slowly, gingerly. “How do you think I feel?”
David winced. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think Odi would hurt you like that.”
“Are you truly sorry?” He finally looked at her, and her eyes seemed to pierce his soul. “If you were sorry, you’d let me go.”
He winced again. “You know I can’t do that. You know what we’re planning, who we are. You’d run back to Shamla and ruin all our plans.”
“Are you sure you don’t want me stop your plans?” She twitched her head, shaking some of her hair away from her face. “Where did all this anger come from? You didn’t have it when we last met.”
David clenched his fists. “You don’t know what’s happened to me since then! I’d been treated to every injustice, and you ask how I can be angry!”
“Tell me,” Tresas said softly.
For a long time, David just stared at her. Tresas didn’t really care. She was just pretending to care so he’d let her go. He nearly told her anyway. Then saw the prophecy lying on the table. “What did this mean?” he asked, waving the paper in front of her face.
Tresas closed her eyes. “I don’t know everything, David. But I do know that, if you continue on your current path, you will bring suffering to Bantong such as has never before been seen.”
David clenched his fist, wrinkling the paper. “Whatever happens you Bantonans brought down on yourselves. I’m not the only one angry.”
“Where is Bramira?” Tresas asked suddenly. “You had it before.”
“It was taken from me when I was stripped of my priesthood.”
“You need to get it back. If it glowed for you, then it belongs with you.” She tilted her head to the side. “I wonder why. Maybe you should have become a Beloved Priest.”
David stood, pacing back and forth in front of her chair. “Like that would have made a difference! My life was over the moment I was dragged into Bantong! Look, can you tell me what the prophecy means or not?”
Tresas lowered her head. “I have said everything I know. I cannot see anything else.”
“You’re useless!” David threw up his hands. “I knew you would be! Your last prediction was worthless too! You should have seen Conal’s death around him, not me!”
“You think I saw your friend’s death?”
David froze halfway between steps. “Was it someone else who will die? Who’s left?” Was there anyone else on Bantong whose death he’d mourn?
Tresas shrugged, an awkward movement tied up. “I don’t know, but I still see the person on the bier when I look at you. It’s no clearer than when I first saw it, but it’s there. That means it hasn’t happened yet.”
He put the prophecy down on the table and smoothed out the creases. Maybe there was a connection between the dead person and the prophecy? They both involved him. You stand tall while white cowers. Maybe a Cardinal would be killed in the attack? He looked at the last line. Aeons lies still and silent before you. Or maybe Aeons would be killed in the attack.
David snorted. That was ridiculous. Aeons was a god; he wasn’t going to be killed by a bunch of jiang shi. Besides, he wasn’t on Bantong. David folded up the paper and slipped it inside his pocket. “So you can’t tell us anything useful.”
“Visions cannot be forced,” Tresas said.
“I think Odi just disproved that,” David said. “And if you don’t want him roughing you up anymore, you might want to consider being a bit more helpful. We still have time before we attack. Now that he knows you can be encouraged, Odi will be back for more.”
Tresas shivered, whatever composure she’d regained melting away. “Help me,” she whispered. “Please, you were once a good man. Don’t let him hurt me.”
David looked away. “I was a good man?” he said. “Then you know I’m not one anymore. I think you should stop talking now, or I won’t wait for Odi to come back.” He sat at the far end of the table, wanting to be as far away from Tresas as he could. He leaned the chair back and propped his feet up on the table, staring at the ceiling. “I don’t care,” he said, so softly he could barely hear himself over Tresas’s quiet cries. “I will get my revenge. Nothing matters other than that.”
He wanted so many things still. He wanted to be someone great. He wanted to prove he wasn’t evil. He wanted to talk to John one last time. But he knew none of that would happen now. He couldn’t do any of that. The only thing he could do was get his revenge, and that he would do.
6
The Gateway to Law
“Was Odi able to get any more information out of Tresas?” David asked, sitting in the back of the van next to the gateway manipulator.
“No,” Seth said from the driver’s seat. “He didn’t hurt her much anymore, though.”
“That’s good,” David said, wondering what would happen to Tresas. Even if they got away with the attack – and he had his doubts about that – they still wouldn’t be able to let her go. He wondered if Odi planned to keep her prophesying until he finally killed her. He still had the scrap of paper with her prophecy in his pocket. He carried no weapons and felt naked. He’d lost his agitator capturing Tresas. He had an extra agitator at his apartment – he hadn’t given all his spares to the Core – but he hadn’t been home since before he kidnapped Tresas. Anyway, if Volk was right, an agitator wouldn’t be much good against a jiang shi. He’d feel better if he had one though.
Seth turned a corner and stopped the van in a small alleyway. He, David, and Saikee climbed out, carrying the manipulator carefully. “Here,” Saikee said, leading them to a corner between two short buildings. David saw no windows overlooking the alley, and nothing in the alley itself save two dumpsters. They placed the manipulator against the far wall, directly across from the street. It was early in the morning, just after dawn, and only the occasional car drove past the alley. Saikee knelt beside the manipulator for a few minutes, making sure all the settings were correct. Satisfied at last, she handed David the remote. “Wait up there,” she said, pointing to the building on the left, taller than the others. “The remote has a limited range.”
“Can jiang shi climb?” David asked. A fire escape clung to the side of the building, right up to the top.
“I don’t know,” Seth said, and Saikee shrugged.
David sighed, “Great.” Well, he’d see any jiang shi coming, at least. Hopefully there was another way to get down from the roof. Glancing the other way, he could see the Mitra Judiciary Building rising above the rest of the skyline, only a few blocks away. The jiang shi should have no trouble reaching it.
Seth took David’s wrist and checked his watch, comparing the time to his com pad. “The gateway is due in an hour. The manipulator’s set up so it won’t redirect any other gateways.
Turn it on just before the gateway opens, at 8:11 by your watch. Call if there’s any trouble.” He and Saikee climbed back into the van and drove away.
“Right,” David said, wondering how he’d gotten the job of using the remote. If something went wrong, he’d be among the first the jiang shi grabbed. He stuffed the remote into his pocket and started to climb the fire escape. The metal creaked alarmingly, and at least once David thought the whole thing would come off the side of the building. He made it to the roof though and found another fire escape down the opposite side in case the jiang shi did come after him. He sat down near the edge of the roof, barely able to see the manipulator five stories below. “Now I wait,” he said to himself, looking at his watch. Still fifty minutes to go.
He took the remote out of his pocket and placed it beside him. He wondered if he should test it one more time then decided not to. So close to the gateway opening, turning on the manipulator might mess something up. He took out his com pad and turned it on to check for reception. To his surprise, he’d received ten calls since he turned it off two days ago. He didn’t recognize any of the numbers, so he switched the phone back off. Seeing the missed calls made him fidget. Other than the one call from Brigid, only Pludes, Seth, and Saikee had called him since his defrocking — he had all their numbers saved on his com pad. He’d been worried that someone was looking for him. Now he had evidence that maybe someone really was. As soon as he turned on the remote, he’d leave. He wouldn’t stick around to see how much damage the jiang shi caused.
He looked at his watch again. 7:38. Still over a half hour. He wondered what sort of buildings surrounded the alley. Back doors from each building opened onto the alley. Would the jiang shi be able to break inside? If so, whoever was inside these buildings would be among the first to die. If he warned them now, they’d get away in time. If he warned them now, they’d have time to call in the Sword Priests and the whole plan would fall apart. This close to the Mitra Judiciary Building, most of the people in the area would be Law Priests. He remembered the whole farce of a trial he’d endured, how Keri and Kemi and their people had also been punished. The Law Priests deserved this, he reminded himself. His life had been ruined; the Law Priests deserved to have their lives ruined too.